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May 18, 2019

An RFP

Last February I left teaching and started working for Illustrative Mathematics. It's been an amazing opportunity to think deeply, collaborate with fantastic people, learn new things, and build a product I'm immensely proud of. More units have been released since our initial preview, go check them out! https://curriculum.illustrativemathematics.org/HS/teachers/index.html

One thing I got to learn at IM was how to code images using tikz. Who knew all those "graphing a picture" projects in Desmos would turn out to be so useful? Not only can I generate a stick figure, my code is so fancy it's easy to move the arms around to recreate the entire semaphore alphabet. So cool right?? (This is where you nod and say, "Sure Tina..." while waiting for the point of this post.)

Another thing I learned about while working at a non-profit was the grant process. And this post is a riff off of the RFP, Request for Proposals. Since the HS curriculum will be finalized in June I'm looking for a new job. I have some ideas, but I know that the collective mind of this community will help me dream up things I can't even imagine. The more I learn the more I realize that this world is filled not just with jobs, but entire careers, that I never even thought of. So I'm asking for your help.

As I've mentioned before, during my reading of Dare to Lead I identified my values as community and making a difference. So I'm holding those two ideals close as I consider possible paths. Community means a variety of things, but it includes my family, so I'm restricting myself to jobs I can do remotely or locally. Other than that I'm trying to cast a wide net as I consider options and opportunities.

Current thoughts:
- Follow our curriculum to its next stage by working with one of IM's partners to get our materials professionalized according to their style and added to a new platform.
- Coach or teach at a local high school.
- Open a math and science museum downtown.
- Do a variety of consulting work and write a third edition of Nix the Tricks to help market that.
- Find something short term and apply for a PhD program (I even came up with a topic last night - studying math instruction for students with disabilities, specifically how they so often get stuck doing rote work with tricks or a list of steps).

I'd also love to work for Elizabeth Warren's campaign, but based on the fact that I get daily emails from her asking for money, I'm feeling doubtful that she's looking to pay people with no campaigning experience. However, activism work both within and outside of math education is appealing. That's definitely an area where I don't even know what jobs exist, let alone how to find them.

So, let me know what job openings you hear about, what avenues you think I should research, and your favorite parts of the new IM HS curriculum!